This is the second
half of McMurry’s year-long survey of U.S. history, and follows chronologically
from History 2310, which is U.S. history to 1877. History 2310 is not,
however, a prerequisite for History 2320. The course begins with the end
of the Civil War (or, as the winners used to call it, the War of the Rebellion)
and extends to somewhere around the present day. During this period, the
United States went from being minor country which was a nice place to live
(at least if you were white and protestant), to being a world power. The
course will explore what made it such a nice place, whether it was in fact
that much nicer or different than other places, and whether the things
that made it nice a hundred years ago are still around having their effect
today. Americans since the Puritans have seen themselves having a special
place in the world; what, in fact, has made us different from Germans or
Chinese or Trobriand Islanders? Have we just had more refrigerators, or
better sermons in church? Or are we really not all that different after
all? While you probably won’t have a definitive answer to all this by the
end of the semester, you should have a more precise notion of the issues
involved and how they fit together over time to frame both how we see ourselves
and how others have seen us.

What You
Have to Do to Pass the Course

1.
Unless you’re smarter than the instructor, the most obvious thing you need
to do is come to class. Even if you get the notes from other students,
you'll miss the level of information that comes only from taking your own
notes. Second-hand information is sort of like second-hand smoke: not all
that great and potentially dangerous to your (academic) health.If you miss
enough classes, your name will be turned over to the Registrar’s Office
for future extracurricular contacts.

2.
Similarly, you should expect to do the reading assignments
— not the evening before a scheduled test, but
before the start
of the week in which they will be covered. The books provide the detail
which will flesh out the general themes discussed in the lectures; they
also provide a lot of detail which will not be covered in the lectures
at all, for lack of time, and which will come back to haunt you on the
tests if you haven’t read it over. If it doesn’t make any sense the first
time you read it, read (study) it again. You'll find learning objectives,
chapter summaries, outlines, and study questions at the on-line Learning
Center for the textbook at http://www.mhhe.com/socscience/history/usa/unfinishednation/sinst.htm.

3.
There will be six (6) reading quizzes in the course, based on specific
chapters from Snapshots in Time. These cannot be made up, though
they can be taken early if you know you’ll be gone on the day(s) they are
scheduled. Since only the four highest scores will be counted, you can
miss two quizzes with no lasting effect on your final grade, unless missing
two gets you into thinking you can miss the other four as well.

4.
There will be three (3) noncomprehensive tests in the semester, each based
on the material covered after the previous test (or the start of the semester).
They will include both objective and essay questions, as well as a map
section. Unless you like all-essay makeup tests, you should endeavor to
take the tests at the times scheduled.

5.
Finally, there will be a 3-4 page typed, double-spaced paper, based on
research in the library and on the Internet. You’ll be assigned a year
at random between 1865 and the present and write about the most important
(or interesting) thing that happened in the United States during that year.
Specific guidelines will be forthcoming later in the semester. Note the
due date on the assignment schedule: late papers will lose two percentage
points of their grade for every day they are late.

6.
Your final grade will be computed as follows: 21% for each of the three
tests; 21% for the paper, and 16% for the average of the four highest quiz
scores. Grading will follow a standard scale: 90%-100% is an A, 80%-89%
is a B, 70%-79% is a C, 60%-69% is a D, and 59% and below constitutes an
F. Since McMurry does not include plus or minus notations on the
final grade that goes on your transcript, an 89 will be a B just like an
80 (since you can’t get a B+, the obvious solution is to aim for at least
a 90).